The Prudence Penny Regional Cookbook

A friend who knows my penchant for cookbook collecting recently gave me three vintage cookbooks! I have quite a few mid-20th century titles, including some that I’ve inherited from my husband’s late grandmother. I especially love the food photos, with their faded tints and utter lack of food styling as we know it.

On the copyright page is a hand-written recipe for “Sausage out of Hamburger” and on the back flyleaf is one for “Pumpernickel Bread” as follows:
4 c Sunny Boy — Red River cereals (all or 1/2 + 1/2)
1/3 c molasses
2 1/2 c boiling H20
1 T salt

Put into bowl let sit for 1 hr.
Bake 300 degrees 1 hr.

That’s it! Just the kind of bread recipe you’d expect from someone who clearly knows how to make bread; they just need a reminder of ingredients. Inside are fascinating recipes for things like “Fisherman’s Johnnycake” (cornmeal cake batter spread on a flat board and placed upright before an open fire to cook); “Lady Baltimore Cake” (very popular at that time, with a filling of nuts, raisins, and candied fruits); and “Baked Abalone” with cracker crumbs and tomato juice. I just love to read these old recipes and learn what kinds of things people ate then and what ingredients they used. There was oleo rather than margarine and very few spices outside of salt, pepper, cayenne, and cinnamon.

Not only do I enjoy reading old cookbooks, but I sometimes cook from them as well. Where else would I find a recipe for abelskivers after a friend gave me a pan for my birthday? Or a steamed savory pudding to use that vintage mold I bought years ago? And you can’t beat them for great dessert recipes. I’m eyeing the “Tennessee Persimmon Cake” for later this year when my persimmon tree is full of fruit. In the Prudence Penny book, it says, “Gather Them After the First Frost, as the Mistletoe Begins to Whiten.)

Thanks for writing this, Ann. I enjoyed it a lot as I have an affinity for old cookbooks, too, even though I don’t collect them. I do go to old bookstores and like to read through them. Maybe I should buy one or two as I have a persimmon tree as well and it’s hard to find any information about how to cook with them. And I know that there was a time when everyone was eating them. I did read that persimmons lose their bitterness after freezing, so maybe the frost is a natural freezer effect.

I hope you will make that Tennessee Persimmon Cake and share with us how it goes:-)

I’m going to echo everyone’s interest in abelskiver–If you get a chance put up a recipe for one!

On a more serious note, though, I was wondering how relevant the recipes are for the modern day. I love history, and I can only imagine that eating habits have changed drastically, with the larger availability of more ingredients and more recognition of different cooking styles. Are the recipes from the past so distinct that it’s practically a different cooking style?

Also, what old cookbooks would you really recommend for someone interested in exploring old-fashioned American cooking?

Edmund–You’re right that ingredients and cooking styles have changed radically from the past, but I think that vintage recipes are still relevant. They teach us about how people used to eat, which is always relevant to learning about history. It’s also fascinating to me to see how recipe writing has changed. You tend to get much more detail now and more exact measures than you used to. That helps modern cooks who may not have grown up cooking but still want to make something.

My two favorite old books for old-fashioned American cooking are earlier editions of Joy of Cooking and the Betty Crocker Picture Cook Book from the 1950s. The Joy of Cooking has changed significantly from edition to edition in the kinds of recipes it includes.

I like to search for everything that is related to cooking, and that includes cookbooks, whether they are old or new. There are many great recipes that can be found in the most varied cookbooks, and I would like to try them all some day. This Prudence Penny Cookbook looks like something I should try to find out.

Just found your post about the Regional Cookbook. I just bought a copy and am an avid cookbook collector. I have a blog where I write about the vintage recipes that I cook. You might find it interesting. http://www.unchainedinamerica.com – Lisa’s blog. Thanks!